‘Virtual’ centre to guide on emerging technologies
Posted on 22 February 2008
Hosted by the University’s Science and Technology Studies Unit (SATSU), the Centre for Prospective Regulation (CPR) is a ‘virtual’ centre comprising core staff at York, and associate members at other leading UK, European and US universities.
We can encourage innovation and new technologies that benefit society
Dr Graham Lewis
Phil Willis MP, chair of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Innovation, Universities and Skills, will open the Centre on Friday 22 February 2008. He will address a launch event titled 'Prospective Regulation and Emerging Technologies - Is the British regulatory model sustainable in a globalised world?' which will feature senior regulatory policymakers and leading academics.
Representatives of the Human Tissue Authority; the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA); the Food Standards Agency (FSA), and the Human Genetics Commission will be among speakers at the event, as well as prominent academics from the UK and Europe.
Phil Willis said: "The speed of technological change is breathtaking and the regulatory framework that society has in place must at least keep pace with it. The Centre for Prospective Regulation is a unique international community of cross-disciplinary expertise that will help us to meet that challenge."
The new Centre's director, Dr Graham Lewis, said: "The Centre will provide evidence-based advice to government agencies and the private sector on how to regulate emerging technologies in healthcare, such as personalised medicine and stem cell research, and in sectors such as the food, information and consumer products industries.
"In this way we can encourage innovation and new technologies that benefit society while taking account of public concerns about safety, privacy or other issues."
Associate members of CPR are drawn from Kings College London, and the Universities of Oxford, Sussex, Edinburgh, Bangor, and Newcastle in UK; Maastricht and Twente, in the Netherlands; Vienna, Austria, and Arizona State, USA.
ENDS
Notes to editors:
- More information on the Centre for Prospective Regulation is available at www.york.ac.uk/res/cpr.
- The Science and Technology Studies Unit, in the Department of Sociology, at the University of York, is a specialist unit dedicated to rigorous analysis of the social dynamics informing contemporary and prospective science and technology. It has an established international reputation as a centre of excellence in three areas: the sociology of the biosciences, mobilities, informatics and space, and science and technology governance. SATSU was founded by Andrew Webster in 1988 and has grown now to a core staff of 8 and 11 Associate Research Fellows within the UK and overseas. It has also ongoing postgraduate programmes at Masters and PhD levels. The Unit was also a Marie Curie Training Site between 2001-5 for a postgraduate programme on genetics and society funded by the EC.